Thoughts on Money

Neither he nor the others feel that the hunched shoulders and housing insecurity of their youth were good for their art. The “La Bohème” portrait of impoverished painters and poets was after all a description, not a prescription. “And at least they could afford the garret,” Jacobs-Jenkins says. “In New York, forget it.”

"I just found this hammer. What should I do with it?"

Kind of a weird question, right? But it's just like asking "What should I do with this money?"

Well, uh...I dunno. That's not nearly enough information.

A hammer is a tool.

Money is a tool.

You have to get clear on what you're trying to accomplish in life before anyone can tell you what to do with... See more

Risk isn’t a measure of negative consequences. It’s a measure of uncertainty. And the issue with minimizing risk is that while we protect our downside, we prevent ourselves from achieving any sort of meaningful upside. In this way, risk minimization isn’t an insurance policy as much as it is a collar, and the cost of protecting our downside is the... See more

after writing about money for a decade, what have I figured out about money, you ask? financial security isn't a number, it’s a relationship with "enough."

no number will ever feel like enough when your sense of security is tied to one. you hit the milestone, the goalpost moves, you blame yourself for moving it.

I work with the wealthy, the children of the wealthy and the soon to be wealthy. Please listen to what I have to say. I know you think that if you can just make enough money, your problems will go away. And there will be harmony in your household. And your relationships will be better.Unfortunately, that that’s not how it works. What actually... See more

Time matters. So much of the rat race that squeezes your free time means you have to spend loads of money on convenience purchases (woke up too late for the bus, had to take an Uber; no time to make dinner from scratch; etc) but even more importantly, if you do not have ample free time, you cannot learn how to be satisfied.